Flower day
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Flower days took place in various German cities between 1910 and the beginning of the First World War . On the respective day a certain flower was chosen as a leitmotif and artificial flowers were distributed for charitable purposes in return for monetary donations. The streets were decorated with the appropriate flowers and food and drinks were sold.
The most common form of flowers Tags was the Margeritentag (manchernorts also Margaretentag or Margarittentag ). More Flower Days, which were organized for charitable purposes, which were Kornblumentag which Heckenrosentag and Anemonentag .
Marguerite Day
The Marguerite Days were organized by associations that had set themselves the goal of improving child nursing in local hospitals. The marguerite was chosen because it was symbolically considered the “white flower of mercy ”. The campaign was under the patronage of Empress Auguste Viktoria . Young middle-class girls dressed up with white dresses adorned with daisies (or the other flowers) and distributed artificial flowers for a donation.
Postcards with marguerite motifs still preserved today, which were also sold for the benefit of nursing on these days, bear witness to the elaborately designed flower days in various cities.
In Frankfurt am Main , the first Marguerite Day on November 19, 1910 yielded over 100,000 marks (adjusted for purchasing power in today's currency: around 583,000 euros) net income for baby care.
On May 25, 1911, a daisies day took place in Guben with singing, promenade concerts, sporting competitions and a procession. Almost 10,000 marks were redeemed for needy children.
A daisies day was held in Göttingen on June 9, 1911. For this purpose, the local business people had masts set up in Weenderstrasse and on the market, which were decorated with garlands, flags and daisies. Young women offered daisies for sale. Soldiers were also allowed to stick a daisy on their uniform that day. The proceeds from a carousel operation ( set up by the Lunaburgia student association ) and the sale of food and drinks also served a good cause. A parade with 40 carriages went through the decorated streets and the balloon “Hanover” drove over downtown Göttingen. The aerial photo taken from the balloon was later sold as a postcard.
Further Marguerite Days took place in the same year in Munich , Regensburg (there as Children's Marguerite Day under the patronage of Margarethe von Thurn and Taxis ), Bayreuth and Löbau (there as Margaretentag ), Chemnitz , Bad Neustadt an der Saale , Berchtesgaden , Zittau , Plauen , Zwickau , Leipzig , Marburg , Trier and Berlin as well as the Margarittentag in Bautzen .
In 1912 there was also a daisies day in Dar es Salaam in what was then German East Africa .
Cornflower day
The Cornflower Day used the importance of the cornflower as a "Prussian flower" and symbol of Germanism , which arose in the 19th century ; Organizers were often warrior associations , and the collection was made for “the best of sick and needy veterans” of the wars of unification .
Criticism of the flower days
A heated discussion broke out over the flower days in which many social groups and organizations (charities, supporters of the bourgeois women's movement and social reform , members of the labor movement and the trade unions) took part. It was complained that collecting on the streets posed a moral hazard to the young girls. The genre image rumored in the press reports Berliner W.-Backfisch puts the flower in the buttonhole of a young worker was criticized by Helene Lange as sentimental, as a pose of “descending into the people”.
The trade unions condemned the flowering days because the cheap mass production of artificial flowers - which were mostly made by women and children in homework - had further depressed the already low wages.
Lyric processing
Contemporary poets also commented on the flower days in their works. In June 1911, Kurt Tucholsky, in his poem Blumentag, criticized this as a patronizing social attack on the part of the conservative and wealthy bourgeoisie, with which the government's blatant omissions were concealed. Specifically, the verses published in Vorwärts referred to a cornflower day:
The fat citizen reaches into his vest:
“Take it! my child! ”-
He gives the six with a touched gesture -
the tear is running! -
Because the government has no money for "veterans' retirement" because it is primarily busy pursuing "the reds":
[That] empties their coffers above all else. -
Meanwhile, they are begging for the
warrior
pack on all streets -
Cornflower Day ...
[...]
The poet Klabund took a well-meaning position . It can also in with Blumentag speak a "little countess" who enjoys to this day their freedom and ignores all class distinctions titled poem from 1913:
How free I breathe!
Boldness became a duty -
smiling, I pull the
veil of Fatme from my face .
Because like the Orientals
I usually walked protected,
mother raged,
When I smiled ...
[...]
I don't want to prevent any
looking back,
conductors and clerks -
Oh, I never knew
that they were lovely people.
[...]
literature
- Eva Schöck-Quinteros : Flower Days in the German Empire. Between civil charity and class struggle . In: Ariadne. Forum for Women's and Gender History , H. 39, 2001, pp. 44–64.
- Siegfried Becker: Margeritentag in Marburg: On the floral symbolism of bourgeois festival culture and charitable work in Wilhelminism . In: Folcloristica , Vol. 9 (2005), pp. 345-360.
Web links
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- Leipziger Künstler-Verein (Ed.): Margaretentag, 1912, May 18: Official festival newspaper . Publishing house d. Leipzig Artists Association, Leipzig 1912.
Individual evidence
- ^ Marianne Beese : Family, Women's Movement and Society in Mecklenburg 1870-1920. Neuer Hochschulschriftenverlag, 1999, ISBN 3929544768 , ISBN 9783929544763 , p. 485
- ↑ uni-kassel.de
- ^ Foundations in Frankfurt am Main , p. 107
- ↑ Niederlausitzerverlag.de ( Memento of the original from April 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ stadtarchiv.goettingen.de
- ↑ heute-in-trier.de
- ↑ Kornblumentag in Langenweddingen 1911 ( Memento of the original from October 11, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Eva Schöck-Quinteros: Margaretentage . In: Ariadne 39, 2001.
- ↑ See E-Text at Zeno.org
- ↑ See E-Text with Scan at Wikisource .
